Sarah and Hagar: A Tale of Two Women

In the Bible, Sarah is the matriarch of the Jewish people, while Hagar became the matriarch of the Arab peoples. Their relationship would be an object lesson for the Jewish and Muslim commentators as well as for St Paul. Three feminist interpretations, by Rebecca Forgasz, Rachel Woodlock, and Coralie Ling bring together the Jewish, Muslim and Christian responses to a story filled with emotional, ethical and political implications. From the Parliament of the World's Religions in Melbourne.

Transcript

SONG: Sarah and Hagar

Rachael Kohn: Welcome to a tale of two women on The Spirit of Things. After Eve, the two most important women in the Bible are Sarah and Hagar. They are intimate rivals and the progenitors of two peoples, the Jews and the Arabs.

Hello, I'm Rachael Kohn, you're tuned to Radio National.

Their story goes like this. Sarah, the wife of Abraham, was barren and she encouraged her husband to have a child with her Egyptian maid servant, Hagar, who she gave to him as a wife. But when Hagar fell pregnant she became resentful of Sarah, who in turn treated her harshly. Hagar fled to the desert, but was comforted by an angel who promised her that her child, Ishmael, would become a successful warrior and the father of a great multitude. She returned to her mistress, Sarah, who later in life bore Abraham a son, Isaac. Although Abraham loved both sons, God reminded him that Isaac would be the leader of his children, and told Abraham that he must send away Hagar, but assured the old man that his son Ishmael would be cared for. So Abraham sent Hagar and Ishmael out to the desert where they lived until he achieved manhood, and became the leader of the Arab peoples.

At the Parliament of the World's Religions, held in Melbourne last week, one of the most popular sessions was Sarah and Hagar, where the story of Abraham's two wives was examined through Jewish, Christian and Muslim eyes.

Here are three excerpts, the first from Rebecca Forgasz, the second from Coralie Ling and the third from Rachel Woodlock. Because the session attracted so many people, we had to move to a larger hall, as you'll hear.

Rebecca Forgasz:First of all, Jewish commentators throughout history are very conscious of, and sensitive to, the moral issues surrounding Sarah's treatment of Hagar, as Rachael's just described in her accounting of the story. They're torn between a reverence for their biblical ancestors who of course are presumed to be very righteous, pious people, but also a very genuine concern for the powerless, to the slaves, to the stranger, about which of course there are many, many laws in the Bible, which arguably Sarah and Abraham, perhaps contravened, some of them in their treatment of Hagar.

So some of the commentators resolved this tension by finding ways to justify Sarah's behaviour, often at Hagar's expense. While others condemn Sarah, arguing that the Torah in fact doesn't try to present idealised characters, it in fact deliberately presents morally flawed characters who make mistakes in order that we can learn from them and improve our own behaviour.

Coralie Ling:Back in the 1970s, Christian feminists began singing a different song, coming down from the patriarch's ladder of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, we sang (SINGS) 'We are dancing, Sarah's circle, we are dancing so Sarah's circle, we are dancing Sarah's circle, sisters women all', or sometimes 'Sisters, brothers, all'. It took us a few years to acknowledge that there was a second woman with Sarah, and this is a tale of two women.

In my experience it was when the World Council of Churches declared a decade for the churches to be in solidarity with women. This decade was 1988 to 1998, and women who have celebrated that decade took Hagar as our inspiration. We discovered that she was the first woman in the Biblical story to receive both an epiphany and the theophany. When she fled from Sarah because of harsh treatment, the angel of God found her by a stream and questioned her and gave her the revelation that she would be the mother of multitudes. In response, Hagar named God, the one who had spoken to her, as the God of Seeing.

Rachel Woodlock:So Hagar is seen as the mother of the Arabs, because part of a plan that Abraham sends Hagar and Ishmael away, becomes this plan to establish one of these in Arabia. Hagar's response then is one of faith. First of all in the tellings which come out of the hadith, she queries Abraham as to why are you sending us away? And he's silent, and she asks again, 'Why are you sending us away?' and he still doesn't speak. And then she says, 'Is this God's will?' and he answers, 'Yes', and she accepts this because it's submission to the will of God, part of the greater plan.

Rachael Kohn: Three short excerpts from Sarah and Hagar at the Parliament of the World's Religions in Melbourne. the first speaker, Rebecca Forgaz is an art curator whose current exhibition Women in the Bible: Tricksters, Victors and Mothers is at the Jewish Museum of Australia in Melbourne. The Reverend Coralie Ling is a retired minister in the Uniting Church, who completed her doctorate in Creative Rituals in an Australian Feminist Context. and Rachel Woodlock is a doctoral candidate at Monash University where she's researching the social inclusion of Muslim Australians, and she writes for the Faith column in the Sunday Age. After they spoke at the Parliament, we got together for a conversation for The Spirit of Things about Sarah and Hagar in the Jewish, Christian and Muslim traditions.

Richard Letts: Well Rebecca, Rachel, Coralie, it's great to be talking to you about two very important women, Sarah and Hagar, who are pretty much new to the beginning of the Bible. This is a very interesting session that you have organised, and participated in, in which the Jewish, Muslim and Christian interpretations of Sarah and Hagar are reflected upon both personally and within the tradition. Can I start with you, Rebecca. Just how important is the story of Sarah and Hagar in the Jewish tradition?

Rebecca Forgasz:Oh, it's of central importance. Abraham being of course the first monotheist for Jews and the father of the Jews and Sarah the mother of the Jews, so the first patriarch and matriarch in tradition. So their story generally has a central place in Jewish tradition.

The story of Hagar as part of that story I guess is probably pushed a little bit to the side, because I think that there's historically just a kind of a struggle with some of the moral and ethical issues that arise in it, and so it kind of I think in my memory of learning about it at school and just what I know about it, it perhaps just put a little bit on the sideline so that the rest of the story can move forward.

Rachael Kohn: Well Rebecca, is that anxiety about the way Hagar is banished to the desert even though she has borne a son to Abraham, is that anxiety a modern one?

Rebecca Forgasz:I think to some extent, yes, in that we read it today in the light of the modern Arab-Israel conflict and in the light of kind of I guess Jewish left-wing kind of angst about the Jewish role in oppressing Palestinians through the occupation. So I get that part of it is a modern anxiety, but Jewish commentators have always been very conscious of and sensitive to those moral issues in the story, and whether they make apologies for it and justify it, or they actually condemn that behaviour, there's always been a sensitivity to those issues in the story.

Rachael Kohn: Can you give me an example of, say, mediaeval commentator who showed some degree of anxiety about Sarah and her treatment of her handmaiden, Hagar.

Rebecca Forgasz:One of the most interesting ones is by Nachmanides, or Ramban, as who was the 13th century Spanish biblical commentator, and he very explicitly condemns Sarah and Abraham for their treatment of Hagar, and Ramban actually went on to say, he added of course that what Sarah did was not seen favourably in God's eyes because the text itself says 'And God heard Hagar's distress and responded to her', but he also adds that kind of as a punishment for their treatment of Hagar, Hagar gives birth to a child, Ishmael whose descendents go on to in turn oppress the descendents of Sarah and Abraham, so referring to I guess in the mediaeval context, the fact that Jews were in some parts of the world, living under Islamic rule, and at some periods of time that was a peaceful coexistence, at other times there were tensions. So I guess looking at the story from a later time and weaving the kind of historical reality through the length of that story.

Rachael Kohn: Well Rachael, from the Islamic tradition of course, Hagar is the mother of the Arab peoples. How is Sarah viewed in the Islamic tradition?

Rachel Woodlock:Yes, she's still viewed positively by and large. In the Islamic telling, both Sarah and Hagar have roles to play in submitting to the greater plan of God. Sarah's story is mentioned in the Qur'an, the news that she would deliver a child, even though she was of old age, and her astonishment at that, but then the story is fleshed out in the extra Qur'anic material, and her story is one of miracles, of being delivered from Pharaoh, it's a story of - she's a very beautiful woman, her beauty is noted. It also pre-figures the role of Khadijah, Muhammad's wife, as the first believer in Islam. In Islamic tradition, Sarah was the first believer in Abraham's message, so she plays that role of pre-figuring an Islamic story, so she is viewed quite positively, despite the tensions that occur in the text in the stories in the Biblical stories.

Rachael Kohn: Well Rebecca has mentioned the Biblical commentaries, and you've also mentioned that Islam produced the hadith and other commentaries on this. Is there a sense in which there is a variety of views of what was going on between these two women? Are there different readings in the Islamic tradition?

Rachel Woodlock:Very much so. Because the Qur'an is quite an oblique text and you don't get a chronological story from it, early commentators felt quite comfortable to go to the biblical material to try and flesh out their stories. They weren't sure what aspects to pick, and so you get differences of opinion. Some scholars favour one reading, another scholar favours another reading, and the classic example of this is actually over which son it was intended to be the sacrifice. Early commentators didn't know, because the Bible mentioned Isaac, so some commentators said, 'Well, it must have been Isaac'. And then you had other scholars say, 'Well, the Qur'an mentions it being his only son, and chronologically therefore it must have been Ishmael'. It wasn't until later that it coalesced into being the dominant position was that it was Ishmael, partly to do with political readings of Islamic history as well. But certainly that diversity exists in Islamic tradition very much so.

Rachael Kohn: And did the advert to Biblical traditions change as Islam became a more powerful and a world religion?

Rachel Woodlock:Very much so. In fact if you poll Muslims today it's this attitudes towards the older traditions can be seen in how they approach the Bible, whether or not they respect that as a sacred scripture, just simply one that is older than the Qur'anic scripture, whereas other Muslims take a much more dismissive approach to the Bible and say that it's just a collection of tales, it's been altered and changed, and irreparable. So Muslims take a different view, but the earlier commentators were a lot more comfortable with this idea of cross-fertilisation of ideas, and I think that's something we should resurrect today.

Rachael Kohn: Well Coralie, in terms of your own experience of the Christian tradition, was the story of Sarah and Hagar important?

Coralie Ling:The story of Sarah and Hagar were not important in terms of telling the Christian story as I understood it from some time ago, but in my own reinterpretation of the story, that they are both very important as key figures in terms of how women relate to the divine.

Rachael Kohn: Well you have been very much involved in feminist theology, having been one of the first ordained women in the Methodist church and in the Uniting church here in Australia. How have feminists looked at the story of Sarah and Hagar? What are the key issues? Because of course, fertility plays a pretty strong role in it.

Coralie Ling:Yes, it does, and I suppose on even modern issues is the question of surrogacy as well. But Hagar was a surrogate mother, does play some importance in terms of thinking about ethics in surrogacy in the ancient stories and how they might relate t that. But obviously the role of mothers has been very important, but for feminists, we've also wanted to emphasise that there are other roles that are important as well as that of motherhood, and Hagar has been able to symbolise some of the other roles, such as being a theologian and a survivor of patriarchy and somebody who could see a new way through the desert. So those sort of new visions of what women might be Hagar can represent.

Rachael Kohn: It's interesting that you call Hagar a theologian; what's the basis of that? Is it merely that angels spoke to her?

Coralie Ling:It's not merely that angels spoke to her, it's that she reflected on that experience and was able to offer a name for God, which was the one who sees, and in offering names for God and then thinking about what our experience means in terms of the divine, I think that's a way of doing theology.

Rachael Kohn: And what about Sarah, she was of course a recipient of a miraculous birth late in life. Does she have a role in Christian theology today, or is it Hagar who's been elevated above her? Almost in contrast to the original story.

Coralie Ling:I think in my own experience, Hagar has been elevated above Sarah, but there's certain aspects of Sarah that are really important. I mean one of the ones is the role of laughter in relation to how one lives one's life, and how Sarah embodied laughter. Some of it was condemned but also some of it was really positive in the terms she called her child, the child of laughter, Isaac, so that's been seen as really important in feminist theology because laughter has often been condemned and dismissed as not being appropriate for religion, and so I think that's very important.

And then the other aspect about Sarah which I only want to see done as a symbolic thing, that somebody who was 90 years old could give birth to the new and so the whole idea of honouring of old age, of older ages and what that might bring forth is very important in terms of understanding different kinds of theology.

Rachael Kohn: Rebecca, what about the patriarchy in the story? I mean today we use that term very freely, because it's been a kind of inheritance of feminist theology and feminist critique. Do you think it's legitimate to see this story as patriarchy in terms of the modern way in which we would like to see the relations between men and women, or are we missing something by simply politicising it in those terms?

Rebecca Forgasz:No, I think it is a very legitimate reading of the text. I think that we can see here the Biblical story I think doesn't present it as a story of two women per se, it presents the story to women as mediated by Abraham, and presents them in relation to the needs that they fulfil in a patriarchal society, and that they both need to, you know there's this competitiveness because they want to produce, they need to produce an heir for Abraham and that's really the underpinning of the whole story. So I think it's really legitimate to see as an alternative perhaps more redemptive way of reading the story to try and find a relationship between these two women, and to see them - we sort of the story presents itself as Sarah victimising Hagar but I think that it's possible to read them as both being victims of the patriarchal society themselves, and I think there are lots of feminists from Jewish, Christian , I'm not sure of in Muslim traditions, but certainly who take that approach and I think it's important to do that.

Rachael Kohn: What about the other kind of political reading of the story, which is kind of seeing the Arab-Israel conflict through it? Is that kind of reading destined to perpetuate the polarities between the two women and then also between the nations?

Rebecca Forgasz:I think it can and has the potential to. I think one way of reading is that the descendents of these two women are doomed to be rivals for evermore, and certainly you could say that the Bible inscribes that relationship.

I think though that the whole approach of interpreting the text, and reinterpreting the text and creative interpretation of the text, allows us to imagine a different ending for that story, because the story still continues today, so I think that by necessity we do read Biblical stories in the light of contemporary circumstances, and what I think is dangerous is to say that this is the only possible way to read this Biblical story, and therefore there is only one political outcome to this situation. I think that people with religious commitments and connections to Biblical texts will always read contemporary circumstances into Biblical texts, and I think that we have to find more ethical ways of reading those stories that don't lock us into rivalry for evermore.

So there are examples of readings of the story that try to find reconciliation between Sarah and Hagar, and that's really in the hope that that will lay the foundation for a better future. So I think it's important to do those things.

Rachael Kohn: Can you give an example of a better reading, one that is a little more conciliatory and focuses on the ethical?

Rebecca Forgasz:There's a beautiful prayer that was written by an American rabbi called Lynn Gottleib and she wrote it to be used in the Jewish New Year liturgy, which is a time actually where the story of Abraham and the sacrifice of Isaac is read as part of that liturgy, so she introduces a prayer that she's wrote (sic) called 'Achti', which means 'My Sister' in Arabic, and it's Sarah's apology to Hagar. So Sarah speaks to Hagar in a way that she never does in the Biblical text, but she offers her an apology, apologises for not knowing her by her name, for abusing her and that's meant to kind of be a call to modern-day Jews and Muslims and Israelis and Arabs to try and find a way forward.

Rachael Kohn: Doesn't this undermine the importance of women's commentary in that this seems the sort of thing that men would not have penned?

Rebecca Forgasz:I think sometimes, I mean think there's, I want to avoid a kind of thing that women have a kind of natural bond because we're all mothers and therefore we all connect. I think there are very real differences that do divide us and I think it's important not to gloss over them in creating a kind of false universal sisterhood. But nevertheless there is that idea of women who do rally together because they are mothers of sons who are getting killed in wars, and that creates a kind of common ground to try and put an end to those conflicts. So I think there really is something about women coming together that opens spaces for dialogue and reconciliation that maybe doesn't happen with men.

Rachael Kohn: Rachel, are there such commentaries coming from women today in the Arab world, or the Muslim world?

Rachel Woodlock:Yes, very much so. There is a Muslim feminist reclaiming of theology, although not all female commentators would label themselves feminist because of the baggage sometimes that word carries. I do call myself a feminist because I think it's the science of emancipation of women. But certainly one of the tools for asserting women's rights and looking at how to redress the wrongs and the oppression that women experience, is to go back to the texts and to look at these female role models and look at how they live their lives, because they were often non-stereotypical ways that they lived their lives.

Hagar in the Islamic tradition is a very powerful woman, she's the mother of the Arabs, and in one story, the story where Ishmael is about to die in the desert, and the angel Gabriel actually dips his wing in the sand and the well of Zamzam water appears and Hagar, when an Arab tribes comes along to find out why the birds are circling overhead to find there's water, Hagar insists that this is a gift for all humanity, not just for the Arab tribe that came upon them and took them into their homes.

So she is a very powerful woman, who sets a religious ritual for all Muslims too, when they go on a pilgrimage, they follow the pattern, the actions that Hagar undertook. so looking at these very powerful women I think is very important for certain women's rights today.

Rachael Kohn: Rachel, that's a very powerful and beautiful image of a woman actually being not only the mother of Islam, but really of a universalist vision. Is there a lot of recognition in Islam for Hagar in terms of her universalism? Is she revered or is this a kind of a task that women will have to be pushing to the forefront?

Rachel Woodlock:Yes, I think the latter. One of the points that is important to recognise in the Qur'an, chooses specific stories about pre-Islamic figures. Actually Muhammad doesn't play as much of a role in the text of the Qur'an. A lot of the stories are more to do with Moses and Abraham and the pre-Islamic figures. But the Qur'an chooses women to tell stories that are instructive not just for women, but for men as well, for all of the audience of the Qur'an. And so it's important I think for us to recognise that these women are role models. I don't think that's necessarily being stressed as much as it could have been and it's an ongoing project.

Rachael Kohn: That's Rachel Woodlock, the Muslim commentator on the Biblical story of Sarah and Hagar. With her is the Reverend Coralie Ling of the Uniting Church, and Rebecca Forgasz, who's Jewish, and her exhibition, Women in the Bible, is on at the Jewish Museum of Australia.

The song is Sarah and Hagar, by Vocolot.

SONG: Sarah and Hagar

Rachael Kohn: Can I ask you, Rebecca earlier referred to the kind of anxiety that Jews often have in reading this story, particularly through the lens of current conflicts. But also in the past; is that sort of anxiety evident in the Islamic tradition?

Rachel Woodlock:Certainly the commentators were aware that there was an angst between not just the story, but also the readings of the story, and you can see this not so much in the Qur'anic text but in the commentaries, picking up some of the threads from the Jewish and Christian commentators on this story. However, when we look at the political situation today, Muslims don't often reference this particular story to talk about the difficulties that exist. If they do, they may talk about perhaps the situation in the time of the Prophet, with their Jewish tribesmen that were part of the story of Muhammad, more so really than Sarah and Hagar and Isaac and Ishmael.

But Farid Isaac who's a South African scholar, made a very good point when he said that when the Qur'an talks about Jews or Christians as categories of people, it's tempting to universalise these as all Jews and all Christians, when actually we must remember the context in which the Qur'an and the prophet Muhammad lived his life and the Qur'an was revealed, and not universalise them because these particular Jews and Christians that lived in the time of the Prophet Muhammad - and also I should mention too that the Qur'an censures Muslims who were acting impiously and were hypocrites and censures them for activities that were injurious to the prophet Muhammad. However, we don't universalise those and say all Muslims are bad. Why should we do the same with, for example, the Jewish community, when the Qur'an itself actually advocates positive statements about Jews and Christians as well as some of the more difficult messages?

So yes, getting back to the question you asked, it was more I think to do with the incidents in the life of the prophet, more so than Isaac and Ishmael.

Rachael Kohn: And yet that very thing that you have cautioned against, is one of the ways in which people read the holy texts, that is, to take these incidents from the ancient past and universalise them. So how does one pick and choose between those things that can be universalised to give a positive message and those that must be avoided because they could create even more conflict?

Rachel Woodlock:Well certainly from a Qur'anic perspective, the story is always trying to bring out a moral message that we need to follow, more so than categorising whole groups of people as good or bad. The text states over and over again that it's not righteousness to call yourself this or that, it's righteousness to act in a righteous way. So I think where the theology that tries to categorise whole groups of people is problematic or even whole groups of people as eternally good, you know the notion that somehow Muslims are all wonderful going straight to heaven and everything, is not theologically supported in the Qur'an. That's where we must have our warning bells and look at the moral messages rewarding good behaviour and trying to move away from bad behaviour.

Rachael Kohn: Coralie, how about you and the Christian reading of the story of Sarah and Hagar? Does it have strong ethical ramifications for you?

Coralie Ling:I think the ethical ramification is understanding Hagar as someone who is a slave and suffering because of that, so the ethical implication is sort of broader about the importance of women not being slaves, and that would go wider again, men shouldn't be slaves either, but the whole issue of slavery would be one of the ethical issues. But I think the Arab-Israeli conflict, I mean I can see how it has been applied, but I don't think on the whole, Christians have interpreted it in that light.

Rachael Kohn: And yet there does seem to be quite a strong emphasis on the elevation of Hagar and one wonders whether this is really a reflection of the politics, say, of the Uniting Church, or of the World Council of Churches.

Coralie Ling:Well I think the Uniting Church I can speak more easily of than the whole World Council of Churches, but I think the Uniting church has been very sympathetic to those who they feel are suffering. Again it can be argued as to who's suffering most in the Arab-Israeli conflict but it's certainly true that numbers of people on both sides have suffered, but as far as the situation in Palestine, the Palestinians, there's some Christians as well, as part of the Palestinian group, and it does seem that they've been in continual - see I'm sympathetic - they have been under continual domination since 1948 and it does therefore seem that they ought to be liberated. So liberation is one of the key issues in liberation theology, and that's been an influence in the Uniting church, and the World Council of Churches.

Rachael Kohn: Getting back to Hagar, I mean you have called her a slave and yet it's quite interesting to have heard that there are also other interpretations of her as having a more elevated background.

Coralie Ling:Yes, I realise that there are other ways of interpreting Hagar's life, and I think you have to recognise that slavery, because that is in the text, but you can also look at - you could possibly interpret her as being a wife and you can certainly interpret her as being free once she's in the wilderness, and leading a different life.

Rachael Kohn: Yes, I think there are some commentaries in which she is actually a Princess, Sarah's daughter, is that right?

Rachel Woodlock: Certainly, well there is some debate about that. I think that's probably more the Jewish commentary?

Rebecca Forgasz:Yes, there is one Jewish commentary, the Midrash, that says that Hagar was the daughter of Sarah, and Sarah had given her over to the household of Abraham and Sarah. This is of a previous incident where Abraham had passed her off as his sister, rather than his wife, to kind of save his own skin, and God had intervened to ensure that no dishonour was caused to Sarah while she was in Sarah's household and Sarah was of course very impressed by this mighty God who had protected Abraham and Sarah, and so handed over Hagar his daughter, to the household, and that's how she became a slave in the household.

But I think that kind of comes in as a way of trying to explain, I think this particular Jewish commentary, trying to grapple with the problem, it's a theological problem of why is Sarah infertile and Hagar who is supposedly of much lower status than her, a slave, whereas Sarah is the wife of Abraham, and she is the one who seems to be favoured by God with fertility. So it's kind of a way to try and say Well actually she wasn't really just a slave, she was actually the daughter of Sarah and that's why she merited this divine favour.

Rachael Kohn: Rebecca, why do you think this story of Sarah and Hagar is still relevant today?

Rebecca Forgasz:There's a couple of reasons. I guess as you've talked about before in a Jewish context, because of the continuing Arab-Israel conflict, it's seen as one of the kind of the I guess the ancient roots of that story. I think also though for women and for feminism in the Jewish community, there aren't that many stories in the Bible that are stories between two women, and so I think when we find those stories, it's really important for us to examine them, so I think that as part of that context, and of women recovering women's voices and histories and experiences in our text and traditions, I think that's one of the contexts in which the story continues to be important today.

Rachael Kohn: Well if we were to imagine another such trialogue and reflection on Biblical figures or women, who might be the next candidates? And do they necessarily have to be women?

Coralie Ling: Well I think if it's a trialogue between women, we should take advantage of being women and speak about women, because for much of Biblical commentary, certainly in the Christian context, the women have not been heard about. So I'd say Yes, let's stick with the women for the moment anyway. But there's certainly a number of women that could be taken, like Mary obviously has a strong relationship with Islam; well, she was a Jew, wasn't she? So with Judaism too. And the Queen of Sheba, very interesting character who is an outsider to all three, but yet spoken of by all three traditions, and so she's a very interesting one that I think we could do in great depth.

Rachel Woodlock:I love the story of two women, the mother of Moses and the wife of Pharaoh, because they get a mention in Islamic stories too, again, as submitting to the will of God, but the wife of Pharaoh in Islamic tradition, is a righteous woman, a believer in God, who patiently suffers under Pharaoh, and again this has got to do with mothering and surrogacy, similar themes coming out, so I like that story.

Rebecca Forgasz:I think I'd have to go back to the beginning, and go for Eve. I think that would be - we could have a whole year's worth of sessions just talking about Eve, I think there's lots to talk about there.

Coralie Ling:She's the archetypal woman in a way, and she's been so denigrated in some traditions, so it's really important to deal with Eve, I think.

Rachael Kohn: How do you think men would fare being part of this discussion.

Rebecca Forgasz:I find there aren't many men who come along to these conversations, but I think that - I don't know, I think that they would find it enlightening. I mean I think I learned from stories about men, so I think that they've got a lot to learn from stories about women. I think it's about putting the complete stories of our traditions together. I think for a long time we've only known really the stories of men, and to kind of swing the balance back and bring in the stories of women, and have a whole tradition, I think is really important, but I know men often don't come along to these things, and you see the sole one sitting there in the audience, and you wonder how they're coping.

Rachael Kohn: There was one very strong comment afterwards by a man, who was extremely appreciative, and Rachel, I wanted to ask you, after the session in which you all spoke, there were a lot of people, a lot of people, who came and just fastened on the speakers. What was your experience of the responses?

Rachel Woodlock:I think for a lot of the audience, it's the first time they've heard the Islamic version, (or one of the Islamic versions, I shouldn't say there's only one), and I know growing up, because I am a convert, I didn't know the stories. So I sometimes have to try and tease out in my own mind, did I learn that growing up? And I went to both Jewish and Christian R.E., I had a pretty progressive mother, or is this something from my new Islamic tradition? So I think hearing those stories from a different angle is quite interesting for some people.

Rachael Kohn: Well you in fact embody a great deal of this kind of dialogue within you yourself. Didn't you grow up a Baha'i?

Rachel Woodlock:Yes, well I grew up - my Mum became Baha'i when she was 17, and she met my Dad who had become a Baha'i and because my Mum wanted me to become religiously literate and I'd done a few years of Christian R.E. that you did back in those days in the State School System here in Victoria, and the only other religion on offer was Judaism, so she sent me along to Jewish R.E. for two years. I don't think the Jewish R.E. teacher quite knew what to do with me, but I think it kind of innoculated me against a lot of the anti-Semitism that you get as you grow older and you look in the news and you hear the stories and the politics and so on, and I think it was a really good innoculation. I don't claim to be completely free from prejudice and bias but I think that religious literacy is so important for our children.

Rachael Kohn: I agree. I couldn't agree more. Coralie, how about you, what is your own internalising and experience of this kind of inter-faith dialogue?

Coralie Ling:Well it's been new for me, because I've only been involved in interfaith - I've been very strongly involved in the Ecumenical movement for a long time, but with Inter-Faith, I've only been involved I think since 9/11. It was then that I realised that I really needed to get to know something about Islam, and so I got involved with the Jewish-Christian-Muslim Association, and the Council for Christians and Jews. But I think it's very helpful to hear the different perspectives, and I do believe there are many perspectives through interpreting a text, so it's really helpful for me; it enriches my life to be part of this.

Rachael Kohn: And Rebecca, how about you? I mean you have also been very interested. I know one of the shows you curated brought together artisans who were Muslim, Christian and Jewish, and they were making all of these Jewish ritual objects, which actually has some historical precedent as well.

Rebecca Forgasz:Yes, it does. It was actually most of the artists and craftspeople involved in that exhibition weren't Jewish, which kind of mirrors the historical reality that most artisans and makers of Jewish ritual objects also weren't Jewish, so there's a fascinating kind of - we were talking about cross-fertilisation of ideas and of culture and of arts, and of all sorts of things that exist between the three traditions, and I think it's wonderful when we see different examples of that, and we value it and we see ways that we can engage in those things further today.

Rachael Kohn: Well I think you surprised Rachel.

Rachel Woodlock:Yes, I had no idea. I really had no idea that - can I ask why? Why was that, historically?

Rebecca Forgasz:Well for example in the Middle Ages, Jews weren't allowed into guilds, like to make silver and things like that, so Jewish communities had to rely on Christian craftspeople to make silver ritual objects for example. So there's a great tradition of mistakes in Hebrew text appearing on Jewish ritual objects, because of the Christian craftspeople who weren't familiar with the text, and they would just of copy them incorrectly. So yes, that's definitively a historical precedent.

Rachel Woodlock:Because in Yemen, the Jewish community of Yemen was known for their silversmith artistry; they were mainly artisans, so that's an incredible thing to learn.

Rachael Kohn: I wonder if Jewish artisans ever made Qur'anic book covers? Would that have been allowed?

Rachel Woodlock:I'd love to know. Historically I've got to say I don't know a lot about the artists - I'm not an experts in architecture and art, I think it would be fascinating to know. I know certainly in the 10th century, the 9th and 10th and 11th centuries when there was a lot of contact between Jews and Christians and Hindus and a lot of cross-fertilisation of ideas, and I imagine, certainly with trading and so on, there would have been a lot of cross-contact. But I'd love to know.

Coralie Ling:I was just thinking of that novel, People of the Book there was crossover in the illumination of texts. Now I don't have the detailed knowledge to say anything more than that, but I do believe that illuminated texts were definitely done by different faiths, but different faiths did different texts as well.

Rachael Kohn: Yes, The People of the Book about the Haggadah from Sarajevo, yes.

Well there are so many ways that we can all share and learn from each other, and I hope very much that this is the beginning of a three-way interpretation of texts. Can I ask each of you, who do you most identify with in the story of Sarah and Hagar, and tell me why.

Coralie Ling:Yes, well I really do identify with Hagar, because I discovered in my encounter with her that I felt she was a theologian and because I was one of the first women to be ordained and there was some discussion about this, as you can imagine, it was really good to say, Well here's this ancient Biblical woman who was a theologian.'

Rachael Kohn: And someone who had been dismissed and sent out to the desert; I suppose that's important, isn't it?

Coralie Ling:It is important yes, because certainly there are a number of people who are dismissing the whole idea of women being able to be spiritual leaders.

Rachel Woodlock:I'd like to say Sarah, because in Islamic tradition she's the second-most beautiful woman. But I think as a convert probably Hagar, because as a convert in the Muslim community I am still a little bit of an outsider. You never quite lose your convert tag, even though I've been one now for over a decade. Probably I think that outsider status really resonates with me a little bit.

Rebecca Forgasz:I'm having trouble with this. I kind of don't personally really feel a strong connection to either of them. I have to say that I've got a soft spot for Rebecca, in the next generation, I'm a bit of a fan of hers, for no reason in particular.

Rachael Kohn: If you had to side with one or the other though, who would you side with? Or is that the wrong question.

Rebecca Forgasz:I think about this siding is probably the thing that worries me, and I think that's the difficult thing, but I feel like they are pitted against each other and so I find it really hard to have to take one or the other. So I think that there are bits in the narrative and ways of reading the narrative in each of them that I perhaps identify with, that I can sit on the fence parts of each of their stories.

Rachael Kohn: Do you think Judaism could do with a really good ritual around Sarah that would compare to the Islamic ritual around Hagar? Or could it develop a new one, in which the two of them are together. Can you imagine that?

Rebecca Forgasz:I was going to say that that's what I'd love to see actually, not just something just about Sarah, but actually bringing Hagar in there. Our feminist commentators actually who do bring Hagar back into the narrative of Jewish history, and she's actually not an outsider, the Israelite in the Jewish narrative, she's actually squarely within it as an Egyptian slave she kind of foreshadows the experience of the Israelites, as slaves in Egypt, so she actually becomes part of the story that just on the whole, the tropes and the motifs of slavery and redemption, she actually foreshadows those for the people of Israel. So I think there is the possibility of bringing the stories together back into Jewish tradition.

Rachael Kohn: Well Rebecca Forgaz, Rachel Woodlock and Coralie Ling, it's been such a pleasure talking to all three of you. Thank you so much.

All: Thank you, my pleasure.

Song: Sarah and Hagar

Rachael Kohn: Isn't that a lovely song, just perfect for our program today, on these two matriarchs of the Bible, one of the Jewish and one of the Arab peoples. You heard Rebecca Forgasz of the Jewish tradition, Coralie Ling of the Uniting Church, and Rachel Woodlock of the Muslim tradition. All are based in Melbourne.

Now there was a fellow who came along to the session on Sarah and Hagar at the Parliament of the World's Religions. And in the thousands of people who gathered over a few days, I spotted him and asked just why he was interested in the story of Sarah and Hagar. He was David Kunin from New York.

David Kunin: I've always been fascinated with that particular story; I think it's a very instructive story in terms of understanding what's going on in the Middle East today. I do a lot of business in the Middle East; I'm running back and forth and I think about the politics and the solutions and the potential solutions, and I've always felt that there has to be a real investigation of the actual theological stories. And so I've always been drawn to that story, and this was a great opportunity to see a multi-faith dialogue between women. So I found a great opportunity to learn more.

Rachael Kohn: Interesting that you see that story as quintessentially connected to the Arab-Israel conflict.

David Kunin: In some ways Judaism, Islam, Christianity are sibling religions in a very dysfunctional family relationship and a lot of the dysfunction in some ways is buried in the dysfunctional family story of Abraham and his two wives, and the two half-brothers who the fathers of the Arabs and the Jews.

Rachael Kohn: When you pointed out that it's really important to have women look at these texts, what did you learn yesterday that was different from perhaps how you'd heard or received the story before?

David Kunin: I got a couple of great insights from the Christian woman noticing the role that black women in the States have interpreted the story because of the nature of how black women, during the time of slavery, were in a different position in the household, as opposed to being in the field where often black men were as slaves, and as a result that structure of sort of the dominant black woman in the States is something I'd never noticed before and how that really addresses in many ways, the Sarah-Hagar story, or the Hagar side of the story, as the Christian woman had a chance to explain, that that was one great insight that I took away.

Rachael Kohn: Did you have any insight from the Jewish woman's perspective on Sarah? After all you would have been perhaps more familiar with Sarah?

David Kunin: I liked the poem that she read at the end. I've always felt that there's a little bit of Sarah's sort of understanding of what happened to Hagar. I've always been fascinated that part of the story, sort of the pillow talk between Abraham and Sarah as he's trying to explain to her in some ways, how problematic the events of ten years earlier, when Ishmael and Hagar were sent away, how troubling that had always been for him. And I've always felt that one aspect of the tying up of Isaac was Abraham's attempt to sort of finally get across to Sarah how he felt about the issues of his other son and Hagar leaving the household, and so I thought that poem in a way, captured a little bit of that essence in the story that isn't often talked about.

Rachael Kohn: What an interesting take on the Akedah, the binding of Isaac, that's so interesting that it might have been as a result of Abraham's concern over what had happened to Ishmael.

David Kunin: Well I always feel that it's discussed on the high holy days, as God testing Abraham, but in a way Abraham's already been through that test so many years earlier when he's asked to have faith that Ishmael and Hagar will be okay when he sends them off into the desert with her one skin of water. And the fact that in the Jewish tradition they find a well, but in the Arab tradition which was an interesting story for me, is the run between the two hills seven times and the Angel Gabriel creating a spout of water that the Muslims still drink from, ending around the Ka'bah when they're there for the Hajj. It's a fascinating part of their tradition.

Rachael Kohn: Well David, what do you think, or what would you like to see as the role of women in this kind of commentary, in this kind of reflection and reconsideration of the sacred texts?

David Kunin: I think we're entering a really interesting time in the history of the relationships of men and women and women's roles are changing so dramatically in our days that I'm fascinated with the idea of women theologians taking the opportunity to explore the Genesis stories and as they're seen through these three faith traditions. We've all taken the time to consider them, but I think women's voices having been applied to these stories. There's not nearly enough Bruria as the one Talmudic woman's voice that you hear. But outside of that one daughter of a great rabbi, you don't really get a chance to hear from women's perspectives, and I think so many of these stories whether it's the two sisters who decide which one's going to marry Jacob, or whether it's Rebecca knowing which son is really supposed to get the blessing, or this story of Sarah and Hagar, there's many, many stories where I think women's ability to understand some of the texture in the story, will greatly enhance all of our understanding of some of these great Biblical tales.

Rachael Kohn: Before I say goodbye, what corner of the Jewish world do you occupy?

David Kunin: I have had a chance, as I mentioned, to do business in Israel quite a bit and I work with an organisation called CLAL, the Centre for Leadership and Learning. I'm a member of their Board of Directors for the last dozen years, and they've been really a group that's focused on the pluralist discussion between different versions of Judaism whether it's been to keep the Orthodox and the Reform and the Conservative Jews figuring out how to work with each other, that's been their mission, and so I've had a chance to think about that kind of work in the past, and I feel very fortunate to be educated in some of the inter-faith dialogue as well.

Rachael Kohn: David Kunin from New York, commenting on not just interfaith dialogue but also intra-faith dialogue within the Jewish fold, which is now celebrating Hannukah, the festival of lights.

In 2010 we'll be hearing from some of the world-renowned speakers who addressed the Parliament of the World's Religions, including the dissident Catholic priest, Hans Kung, who originated the Global Ethic; Sister Joan Chittister, a favourite with you Spirit of Things listeners, and the inspirational Afghan woman, Sakeena Jacobi, who founded and funs the underground schools for girls in Afghanistan. And many more to keep you totally rapt in the new season of The Spirit of Things.

Sound engineer this week was Philip Ullman.

Next week, it's Peace on Earth, Goodwill towards Men, an ancient vision from Isaiah to Jesus and a modern approach with some young guys and one girl, who had to gird up their loins and jump on a bicycle for peace.

Join me, Rachael Kohn next week for the final Spirit of Things for 2009, before the Summer Season of the year's highlights.

Guests

Rev. Coralie Ling

was ordained a minister more than 30 years ago and is a retired minister of the Uniting Church in Melbourne. She took her D. Min. in Creative Ritual, and is well known through her work in feminist liturgy and outreach in ministry.

Rebecca Forgasz

is the curator of an exhibition at the Jewish Museum of Australia, Women in the Bible: Tricksters, Victors & (M)others.

Rachel Woodlock

is doctoral candidate in Politics in the School of Political and Social Inquiry, Monash University. Her doctoral research looks at how Australian Muslims are transitioning from being a migrant community to a permanent feature of the Australian religious landscape. Her general research interests include Australian Muslims, gender issues, religious conversion and multifaith dialogue. As well as her academic work, Rachel is a practising Muslim. She has conducted training seminars for young Muslims in Australia and New Zealand for the Islamic Education Trust and writes for the Faith column of the Sunday Age. Rachel is married and has a daughter.

Rachel Woodlock is doctoral candidate in Politics in the School of Political and Social Inquiry, Monash University. Her thesis title is 'Being an Aussie Mossie: Social inclusion of Muslim Australians'.